THE HISTORY OF MEDICINE is
as old as civilization itself. Its roots date back to early Egyptian
times with the practices
of embalming
and
mummifying to the time of Hippocrates, the Greek physician now
revered as the “Father of Medicine.” That history is coming
alive at the Louis Calder Memorial Library in an extraordinary collection
of medical textbooks donated by Martin B. Raskin, M.D., a retired
New York obstetrician and gynecologist now living in Lake Worth,
Florida.

Raskin’s collection totals more than
5,000 books and, at 81 years old, he’s still adding to it every
chance he gets. More than half of the publications are on the shelves
in the Emanuel M. Papper, M.D., History of Medicine Reading Room
and in the Rare Book Room at Calder; they started arriving back in
1996.

For perspective on the historical significance
of the collection, consider that almost half of the books reside
in the Rare Book Room.
For a book to be called rare at the Calder Library, it had to be
published before 1864, the year the Civil War ended. Five of those
rare books were published before the 1600s. Not only that, but close
to 400 of the titles are listed in the bibliography commonly known
as “Garrison & Morton.” Now in its 5th edition, the
bibliography lists all major significant authors in the development
of medicine from ancient times to the 20th century.

Currently the oldest book in the collection,
published in 1549, describes medicine and the importance of hygiene
in good health.
It is an Italian
translation of Galen, who is considered one of the most influential
ancient medical writers. A physician and philosopher, Galen was born
at Pergamum in A.D. 129, but spent most of his career in Rome. The
fact that his textbooks were still being translated in the 1500s
is a testament to the significance of his medical and philosophical
writings.

“This gift is extraordinary in its size, scope, and quality,” says
Henry L. Lemkau, Jr., J.D., director and chairman of the Department of the Library
and Biomedical Communications. “If you’re interested in the history
of your profession or just have a great love of history, this collection is unrivaled
anywhere in the state of Florida and is among the top collections in the United
States. For a medical school as young as the University of Miami at 50 years
old, to have something like this in our library brings depth and prestige to
the institution.”

It can make your institution known around
the world as well. Since the Raskin collection is catalogued and
processed on OCLC, an
international database, medical scholars and historians are attracted
to Calder, where they
may find titles not available anywhere else.

humbing through the pages of Dr. Raskin’s textbooks, you
will see many languages represented. In Western medicine’s
earliest days, Latin and Greek were the principal languages. It was
years later that some of the books were
translated and written in French, Italian, German, and eventually English.
You also will find almost every medical discipline represented, making
the collection
a comprehensive history of medicine and the allied health fields.

Though he collects books on many areas of medicine,
Raskin says the textbooks in his specialty, obstetrics and gynecology,
are among his favorites. He started collec-ting as a young medical
student at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine back in
the mid-1940s. “I was interested in the history of medicine,
and I was interested in the various doctors who wrote about certain
things that they discovered, so I got their books. Then I got another
and another, and it just grew and grew, but I never thought it would
grow this large,” says Raskin. He describes himself as a “real
good book hunter,” and says he would go to bookstores wherever
he traveled, attend auctions, advertise for books, and he would even
get letters from people who found books for him.

“The pristine condition of these books
shows this is truly a man’s passion,” remarks Lemkau on
the quality of the collection. Raskin was equally passionate about
medicine. He practiced in Queens, New York, for almost 50 years, delivering
close to 5,000 babies. He also was medical director at Baptist Hospital
in New York and a professor of obstetrics and gynecology at New York
College of Osteopathic Medicine, before eventually retiring to Florida.

Raskin decided to house his collection at Calder
after his wife, a retired family medicine physician, underwent successful
spinal surgery at the School of Medicine. “It’s very easy
for us to get to, we like the people at UM, and I felt in a medical
school library they would be valuable to people doing medical history
studies. They could pick out any type of history they were interested
in and there would be a textbook to fill in the blanks.”

The Raskin family legacy of medicine has a promising
future. His granddaughter is now in medical school in New York. And
Raskin hopes his books will have an endless shelf life; he refers to
them as an education in perpetuity.

Jeanne Antol Krull is director of media
relations in the Office of Communications
at the School of Medicine.
Photography by
Greg Schneider.